Reflection #6

Writing had definitely been the door opener to history and to the establishment of some of the worlds greatest ancient civilizations. Writing first began with the drawing of pictures about 40,000 years ago. It is believed that writing was invented in various places separately from one another, in Sumeria, in ancient Mexico, and possibly in North China. Pictures were soon drawn with the intention of sounding out syllables rather than just meaning. Writing first began to establish civilizations in Southwest Asia because of economic reasons. Humans marked tokens with pictures to label different farm products. The pictures became more complex with the growing of the cities and centers and now they labeled manufactured goods also. The first use of pictures for the use of making sounds was found in about 3100BC. For instance, the picture symbol for arrow was used to symbolize the word “life”. If you read both words, (til,ti) in the Sumerian language they both have similar sounds “t” sounds in the beginning. Pictures soon began to be used as sound symbols. Eventually when the shift of picture symbol to sound symbol was finished and it was possible to symbolize every sound of the Sumerian language, it was said that writing was born. In Egypt, they had pictographs to stand for the first sound of the word they were trying to communicate. This was called acrophony and it made a huge leap to the creation of the alphabet. Thanks to writing the people of the civilizations were able to communicate their needs in other ways other than speech. They were also able to create history and memory. Without writing it was assumed that everyone remembered things, and if they were forgotten there was no way to bring them back. Writing also expanded story telling and myths. Now there were stories written down and available to be passed down throughout generations. Writing helped farmers and hunters to count their livestock and property. It became necessary in the use of economic transfers. Overall writing had created most of the societies we have today. If we think about it, how hard would it be to communicate with one another is writing was never established? How would we read signs while driving or make any type of important contract or business?